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Thursday, June 05, 2014

Bangalore Days

As the opening lines
of Anjali Menon’s enchanting Bangalore Days tells you,
Bangalore is the utopia every Malayali youngster wishes to escape to in search
of his dreams, away from the sluggish pace of Kerala. Shyamaprasad did appear
to sell a similar idea to us in a rather morbid and clichéd form in Rithu but
Anjali Menon’s film is far more promising in its portrayal of the so-called
Bangalore crowd, making the characters far more likeable and easy to relate to.

Family is a recurrence
in Anjali’s works. In her own words – “Friends are the family we choose is a
theme in the film – in this case they happen to be cousins”. With cousins,
there is a blend of friendship and family bonding and the nostalgia of growing
up together in Kerala but lo behold, as time flies, life takes a much serious
turn because all of a sudden, you have grown up. Yes, I take it that the
intensity of this bond diminishes rapidly later on in life unlike in movies,
where such friendships are perpetually renewed.

Three youngsters with
a world full of expectations arrive in the city - Krishnan PP urf Kuttan (Nivin
Pauly) who lands a software job in the city, chirpy Divya (Nazriya Nazim) who
bids goodbye to her MBA dreams to settle down with Das (Fahad Fazil) in
Bangalore and the enigmatic wanderer Arjun (Dulquer Salman) who is a graffiti
artist-cum-bike racer and wants to keep his past firmly behind him. Life takes
its own diversions and they find their lives thrown out of gear in contrasting
ways until these detours help them discover their destiny.

Love in the city comes
in many forms – For the naive Kuttan, it is an ephemeral emotion through the
seductive charm of an airhostess who breezes her way into his life high up in
the skies only to bring him down crashing with a bleeding nose. That is a nice
little piece of writing involved here when Meenakshi (Isha Talwar) appears in
front of ‘Cute’ Kuttan just the way he wanted his dream girl to appear. He
later on discovers, in his own words drunk in the intoxication of cola (the
cola reference brought back college memories!), that Love is like Santa Claus –
a chimera that people create desperately in hope.

For the carefree
Arjun, it is in the mysterious form of a paraplegic radio jockey, Sarah,
through whose voice he discovers the true joys of life. This relationship is
captivating and chimes quietly in our hearts as they feel the pulse that brings
light to their lives. At no moment, is there an attempt to underscore her
handicap and when she ambulates in her wheelchair, clutching his hand, you know
there is nothing more to say and that the man now knows what he wants in life
("I don't want to walk behind you, I want to walk beside you"). It is
wonderful to see a confident, young woman whose disability is not thrust on
your face – think again and you realize he needs her emotional support more
than she does. A positive differently-abled protagonist – when did we last see
that?

In Divya’s case, the
stars never give her an opportunity to fall in love before marriage – it is
something that she has to discover for herself in a marriage with a man who
confesses his inability to forget his past. She is the extrovert girl next door
who is bursting with energy while Das is the dour, workaholic private
individual whose space is extremely sacrosanct – whether it is a room that is
always locked or even his computer password that he doesn’t share. There are
rare glimpses when he drops his stoic guard like when her window painting
brings in the early morning colours but it is a cold relationship and he does
not allow her to enter his private space. In contrast to the freedom that she
enjoys in the company of her cousins, there is an almost claustrophobic feeling
that engulfs her, as she tries to overcome the loneliness created by the vacuum
of Das’ emotional absence in her life. When he asks her cousins what was her
age when she tried to pull a fast one on her mother, it brought a smile to my
face – I liked the way the subtle admonishment is conveyed, without spelling it
out.

The title Bangalore
Days is misleading – it does not invoke either the city or urban
life or nostalgia associated with it; place the three folks anywhere else
and you would still have the same impact. The city does not have a presence or
a character of its own say unlike Trivandrum in Ee Adutha Kalathu or
Kozhikode in Ustad Hotel but I suppose the landscape must be
an attempt to break away from the traditional outlook of the past which Kerala
appears to represent and what better than to locate the story in a city that
represents a lot of Malayali aspirations. Unlike Anjali’s Manjadikuru and Ustad
Hotel which looks at the youngsters as they trace their way back to
their roots, Bangalore Days represents a progression away from their past.
Considering that most movies create a beautiful nostalgic feel of Kerala, such
an image exists here only in the computer images of one of the principal
actors.

There is an attempt to
crack stereotypes and maybe creating this movie in Bangalore gives the film
maker the freedom not to be bound by the conservativeness of the state. I loved
the way that Anjali allowed Kuttan’s parents to free themselves from bondage.
His parents find their calling in different ways; this part is real hilarious
and delivered in an absolute nonchalant way – a father who wants to breathe
after suffocating for years in marriage and a mother who finally gets an
opportunity to break free from the confines of a tiny village and enjoy the
thrills of living in a city, with television, kitty parties, pranayama and all
the vagaries that urban life can present. This segment could have fallen flat
in its execution but is deftly adapted on screen; especially enjoyed the scene
where Kuttan reads and re-reads his father’s letter – how a perspective can
change lives! This could easily have wound up as a tragic set of events but
thanks to Anjali’s script, this becomes refreshingly funny and manages to break
the parental stereotype in Malayalam in more ways than I had ever imagined.

Essentially, every
youth film revolves around discovering one’s true love or is a coming-of-age
movie. To that extent, Bangalore Days does not deviate from this template. It
is an out-and-out youth film but there are no candy floss moments that litter
many juvenile romantic takes or that BINGO moment, when the hero wakes up to
his responsibilities. Love is in the air but it seeps through gradually without
being over-burdened by the exuberance of the youngsters. While the early 20s
can be fun, as time grows and people go their own ways, the same thrill of
being with friends and maybe even alone is replaced by that pensive feeling of
being burdened by the need to be mature and responsible in life – as Divya and
Arjun gradually realize with their life partners or Kuttan discovers in the
transformation that his parents undergo.

With Nivin and Dulquer
getting the best lines in the movie, there isn’t any doubt who the show
stealers are. Nivin has the funniest moments in the film and reminded me of
Saif in Dil Chahta Hai, with his impeccable sense of comic timing.
You positively detest Fahadh in the first half but empathize with him later on
– he is an enigma, always taking on the not-so-liked characters but still
managing to stay with us – the man has a knack of selecting good roles!
Nazriya, possibly in her last film, is the perfect fit for the vivacious Divya
without overdoing it (you know the Kareena-types) but I was pretty impressed by
Parvathi Menon’s mature performance. Despite this humongous star cast, I was
pleasantly surprised by her arresting presence in the film (a future star
alert!).

For all the breezy
nature of the film, I felt that the writing was uneven and inconsistent at
times. The seriousness that was vested in dealing with the relationships of
Arjun and Divya are absent in Kuttan’s case – his illusionary balloon of love
and relationships is burst and presented in a light-hearted way but there is no
real culmination of his feelings. I felt that the writing appeared to juggle
intermittently between a lighter side and serious side, a little unsure at
times where to navigate to.

Das’ background story
is significant and the way it is eventually dealt with it is nice but the past
did have a cinematic feel. Maybe, slightly less dramatic and it would still
have worked just as well. Sure, the cousins are close but I am still reluctant
to accept the close proximity (especially physical) between them – that’s the
kind of stuff that I have seen only in movies. Arjun has very little contact
with his parents and no proper source of income but his appearances hardly
reflect this – an almost Wake Up Sid moment that! At 173
minutes duration, this is a fairly long movie but truth be told, this isn't
much of a problem. You could snip a few minutes here and there and the songs,
trim some of the racing moments, but that’s all.

For a movie that sets
out to be fun and entertaining, there isn't much more that you can ask for and
looking at the audience trooping in large numbers at the theatres, Anjali Menon
has definitely struck gold here…Do we have the Kerala equivalent of Dil
Chahta Hai here finally?

About Me

The word’s LAKSHYA – That’s what I am searching for in my life.I would like to take "The Road Not Taken" but remain a dreamer in words and conformist in actions. I have an opinion on most things happening around and intend to use this blog to express them.